Charter schools "held blameless" by state for low ratings

MIDDLETOWN — Two local charter schools dropped to the lowest rating on the state report card, but are held harmless by the state for those ratings.

Life Skills Academy, a school serving students who have dropped out of high school, and Summit Academy, a school for students with Asperger’s syndrome, ADHD, high-functioning autism and related disorders, are rated in “academic emergency” — the lowest of six designations — on the 2008-09 school year.

Well it seems that we have made another list.
Not even the Charter Schools are making the grade.
We need to march on the school board. 

OK- we have a system in place to evaluate the performance of the charter schools in Ohio. We give the charter schools in Middletown a low evaluation based upon that system, but then quickly dismiss the findings of the evaluation for various reasons. Then, why have this evaluation criteria in place? Why make the attempt to measure the charter schools, if the data is going to be whitewashed and ignored? It is not logical to do so. CHANGE the grading criteria to match the given situation in the schools. In one school, you have ADHD, autism, Asperger's Syndrome, etc. to deal with. Logically, one certainly wouldn't grade this school using the same categories as one would a school comprised of "normal" , but doesn't fit into a traditional classroom setting kids" would you? Obviously, they have two totally different targets to educate here. Why have just one evaluation system in use? I see this as being a different situation than the Middletown Public Schools and their low rated performance. JMO